I'm an Assistant Professor of Economics at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, a Research Fellow with the Oakland, California-based Independent Institute, a Senior Fellow with the Beacon Center of Tennessee, and a Senior Research Fellow with the Institute for Faith, Work, and Economics. I'm on Twitter: @artcarden.

Let's Be Blunt: It's Time to End the Drug War

April 20 is the counter-culture “holiday” on which lots and lots of people come together to advocate marijuana legalization (or just get high). Should drugs—especially marijuana—be legal? The answer is “yes.” Immediately. Without hesitation. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200 seized in a civil asset forfeiture. The war on drugs has been a dismal failure. It’s high time to end prohibition. Even if you aren’t willing to go whole-hog and legalize all drugs, at the very least we should legalize marijuana.

For the sake of the argument, let’s go ahead and assume that everything you’ve heard about the dangers of drugs is completely true. That probably means that using drugs is a terrible idea. It doesn’t mean, however, that the drug war is a good idea.

Prohibition is a textbook example of a policy with negative unintended consequences. Literally: it’s an example in the textbook I use in my introductory economics classes (Cowen and Tabarrok, Modern Principles of Economics if you’re curious) and in the most popular introductory economics textbook in the world (by N. Gregory Mankiw).The demand curve for drugs is extremely inelastic, meaning that people don’t change their drug consumption very much in response to changes in prices. Therefore, vigorous enforcement means higher prices and higher revenues for drug dealers. In fact, I’ll defer to Cowen and Tabarrok—page 60 of the first edition, if you’re still curious—for a discussion of the basic economic logic:

The more effective prohibition is at raising costs, the greater are drug industry revenues. So, more effective prohibition means that drug sellers have more money to buy guns, pay bribes, fund the dealers, and even research and develop new technologies in drug delivery (like crack cocaine). It’s hard to beat an enemy that gets stronger the more you strike against him or her.

People associate the drug trade with crime and violence; indeed, the newspapers occasionally feature stories about drug kingpins doing horrifying things to underlings and competitors. These aren’t caused by the drugs themselves but from the fact that they are illegal (which means the market is underground) and addictive (which means demanders aren’t very price sensitive).

Those same newspapers will also occasionally feature articles about how this or that major dealer has been taken down or about how this or that quantity of drugs was taken off the streets. Apparently we’re to take from this the idea that we’re going to “win” the war on drugs. Apparently. It’s alleged that this is only a step toward getting “Mister Big,” but even if the government gets “Mister Big,” it’s not going to matter. Apple didn’t disappear after Steve Jobs died. Getting “Mr. Big” won’t win the drug war. As I pointed out almost a year ago, economist and drug policy expert Jeffrey Miron estimates that we would have a lot less violence without a war on drugs.

At the recent Association of Private Enterprise Education conference, David Henderson from the Naval Postgraduate School pointed out the myriad ways in which government promises to make us safer in fact imperil our safety and security. The drug war is an obvious example: in the name of making us safer and protecting us from drugs, we are actually put in greater danger. Without meaning to, the drug warriors have turned American cities into war zones and eroded the very freedoms we hold dear.

Freedom of contract has been abridged in the name of keeping us “safe” from drugs. Private property is less secure because it can be seized if it is implicated in a drug crime (this also flushes the doctrine of “innocent until proven guilty” out the window). The drug war has been used as a pretext for clamping down on immigration. Not surprisingly, the drug war has turned some of our neighborhoods into war zones. We are warehousing productive young people in prisons at an alarming rate all in the name of a war that cannot be won.

Albert Einstein is reported to have said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. By this definition, the drug war is insane. We are no safer, and we are certainly less free because of concerted efforts to wage war on drugs. It’s time to stop the insanity and end prohibition.

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Honestly man that’s just an uninformed view you’ve got. Yes, technically doing drugs is illegal and technically you should go to jail. But saying drugs aren’t addicting is just wrong and ignorant. Just because you’ve had an upbringing where you’ve been able to avoid drugs doesn’t give you some sort of justification to say that everyone thinks the same way you do. Tons of drug addicts have faced sexual and physical abuse in their lives and have turned to drugs to deal with that pain. Until you can at least empathize with others you shouldn’t go around trying to upset people. Start a blog or something, damn.

Yes it is illegal, and it is a choice, and those who break the law should be punished accordingly. However, I think the point trying to be made is that police and law enforcers are spending way too much time, resources and effort busting people for pot or setting up undercover busts. We pay in tax dollars for the construction, rent, wages, food, and everything that goes into prisons. Our tax dollars employ local and federal law officers, and we also pay the wages of politicans in power. Why are we wasting a black’s worth of manpower and resouces to punish recreational drug users? Cops should spend more time tracking down rapists, murderers, etc than hanging around the local high schools trying to bust teenagers for smoking pot around the corner. The article contends “we are housing productive young people in prisons.” That should be changed to “potentially productive.” But nevertheless, the point should be taken that war on drugs has not yielded successful results in anyway.

On a more personal level, the whole “If you didnt get the lesson in school, from your parents, or from TV, then your life is beyond sad and I wish you nothing but luck” is condescending and ignorant of you IMHO.

It’s NOT, repeat NOT unjust imprisonment. At this time, in this country it is illegal to drink beer. That means that it is against the law, period. AGAINST THE LAW. It’s a CHOICE to drink beer. No one is hooking you up to a machine and force feeding you the substance, it’s a choice. You make that choice, you take the consequences for your actions, and if that includes jail time, you do the time. Quit whining about being prosecuted for your mistakes! And, in case you havent been paying attention? THEY WOULDNT have jobs now, the unemployment levels would be just that much greater. Im sick and tired of hearing “The war on beer is a failure and needs to end.” Thats crap. Im also sick to death of hearing about how “beer is addictive.” No matter how you try to turn it, no matter how you try to twist the truth, you made the choice to use, you suffer the consequences. AA has been around since the 30′s and every cop show in the world has a moment about “dont drink beer, beer is illegal, beer is bad.” If you didnt get the lesson in school, from your parents, or from TV, then your life is beyond sad and I wish you nothing but luck.

It’s not ‘a choice’ if it’s illegal, is it? It’s a criminalized act, a criminalized substance. Laws are not all good (remember slavery?) and our society does not always make the best decisions regarding punishment (remember executing innocent people – oh wait, still happening).

What kind of person assumes that ‘doing something wrong’ that you’ve been ‘warned about by DARE and cops’ (ha ha ha) deserve their imprisonment?? How does it logically follow that only some drugs are ‘evil’ and ‘bad’ and some are fine and dandy? How is someone who occasionally smokes weed have any more ‘sad’ of a life than the one occasionally drinking, smoking, ingesting caffeine, cough syrup or any of thousands of legal prescription drugs, many of which have far more addictive and mind altering qualities than THC?

It’s this kind of grade school morality-mentality that has unfortunately been seized by and exploited for the benefit of corporate power in this country. We don’t illegalize hemp because it’s evil or destructive, we do it so that we don’t have any competition for petroleum plastic products, newspapers (look up Hearst’s war on weed), corporate pharmaceuticals and to keep the prison industry growing and thriving. The people in jail for weed ‘crime’ DO NOT DESERVE TO BE THERE. PERIOD. It’s modern day enslavement and persecution ala the dark ages.

Get your head out of your bible or your comic books and wake up to the real world, kiddo. There are drugs out there, some people do them, some people need them, and none of those people deserve to have their lives ruined, their families torn apart over owning or using same.

So many perfectly just things have been “illegal” in history. Women voting, black rights, gay marriage, alcohol just to name a few. Basing your beliefs and values on what is law is so myopic. Think for yourself you damn lemming.

Being locked in a cage for using a substance that only harms the user is absolutely unjust. The fact that you seem to have contempt for anyone who disagrees based on the ‘it’s a law’ argument is laughable. I encourage you to look up the vast collections of ridiculous U.S. and state laws that are on the books that don’t get enforced. just google it.

It also disgusts me to hear another blame the victim attitude. “it’s your choice, you should have listened to dare” when you say things like that it just shows that you really have zero clue about what drug addiction is like or how it starts, and you’d rather throw people under the bus than try to understand their problems.

If you want to base what you think is just and unjust around what is current U.S. policy, I would say that YOUR life is beyond sad. Consider getting an education in the real world and stop relying on what your dare officer said in the classroom.

What about Alcohol and Cigarettes? Both are more addictive then Marijuana, and cause more damage to our bodies, but yet, they are legal? Face the facts, since the “war on drugs” started, the Government has spent more then 66 BILLION dollars in trying to stop drug use. In fact, since the war started, drug use hasn’t seen a decline or increase. It has always been steady throughout the decades, but the government keeps pumping money into a war that cannot be won. This country was found on the basis that we are free to do whatever we please with our bodies. Your correct, it is a choice, so why should that choice be illegal? You can go and drink your beers and suck down your cigarettes , I’m going to go and enjoy a nicely rolled joint on this beautiful day. Good day.

Chattel slavery was legal but unjust. The disenfranchisement of women was legal but unjust. Segregation was legal but unjust. They were not only legal: They were Law. Anyone imprisoned for violating an unjust law, is imprisoned unjustly.

I don’t have a problem, conceptually, with de-criminalizing “drugs”. So long as there is no special “protections” afforded the user/abuser. If you are a user and your use affects your ability to perform the work expected of you by an employer (contractually and at-will agreements), then your job can be terminated. You can be refused service at points of service provision (i.e. restaurants, theaters, retail stores, etc…).

I find it very difficult to legislate behavior, which is what the current drug laws concerning consumption and possession of “drugs” amount to being. Being of that philosophical bent, I don’t see any reason to attempt to continue down that path any longer.

Most importantly though, and which is an undeniable foundation to the creation of a “free” society, is personal responsibility. You must be held responsible for the consequences of your actions. You commit manslaughter or other murder, you will be punished for such commission. You show up at the ER because you have ingested enough material to cause heart failure or other organ debilitation. You must pay for such issues, not society.